


Fate

by Sev4Life



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: M/M, One Shot, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-01
Updated: 2016-11-01
Packaged: 2018-08-28 12:28:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8445847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sev4Life/pseuds/Sev4Life
Summary: This is a short story featuring Sherlock Holmes and John Watson, chasing after a possible Sebastian Moran. The man gets away - or so they think.





	

Watson and Holmes. The dynamic duo - the humble army doctor paired with the high-functioning sociopath, the genius that was William Sherlock Scott Holmes. One tall, one short. One dark, one light. What a lovely, functional friendship they had. John, sleeping while Sherlock dissected various body parts from various species. Sherlock, standing over John’s shoulder while he wrote on his blog. John, writing on his blog in a housecoat with messy hair and a cup of coffee, while Sherlock, fully dressed with curls tamed watches him type, as if he never slept. There was one thing they had in common, however. Both were currently dashing after the same criminal.

John panted and ran as fast as his short legs would take him, Sherlock having the advantage with his much longer legs. The blond was in sight - he matched the profile of the suspect perfectly, and with eyes like Sherlock’s, it was almost certain that this man was the man that they needed to catch. Murders, bank robberies, the whole shebang. The man, who was currently turning a corner, causing Holmes to grasp John’s arm and drag him in the proper direction, was supposedly Mr. Sebastian Moran - Comrade and assistant, right hand man to a Mr. Jim Moriarty - the most acclaimed criminal in the world. It was vital that they catch him. If they took a pillar, it would weaken the whole kingdom, right? Moriarty had so many connections, they couldn’t be sure, but it was a good enough attempt. The stranger, however, was just too fast. He turned a corner, and as John and Sherlock reached the same point at the brim of an alleyway, he was gone. Nowhere in sight. John bent over, resting his hands on his knees and struggling to pull a sufficient amount of air into his lungs. “He’s… Gone.”

Sherlock, in the time that John was panting and pulling air in, had already checked most of the vicinity for the suspect. He hopped down from a rusted red ladder that lead up to the roof, having needed to check everywhere. Still, the criminal was nowhere to be seen. “Could you be any more obvious?” he hissed, walking in his normal brisk manner towards the other end of the alley, checking each corner. “I know he’s gone! If you hadn’t tried to drag me in one direction while I was clearly dragging you in the other, we’d have him on the ground! Right here!” He pointed towards the area in front of John’s feet, scowling. They had let him get away. A direct passageway to their worst enemy, and now he was gone. No sight of him, no sound, not one single thing. Zip. Nada. _Gone._

Standing up straighter, Watson glared at Holmes in return. “Oh, don’t you blame this on me!” he shouted, wagging his finger as someone would do to a toddler. The detective often acted like one, anyways. “I’m not always the one at fault, you know. You could stand to have a tiny bit of blame for yourself.” John’s pride was injured and that always turned out to be an argument. Just like an old married couple, John and Sherlock would bicker back and forth, day and night, very rarely finding a middle ground. Eventually, John would give up and just take it, as he did now, after Sherlock shouted more, angry that they had lost their suspect. “Fine. Fine, Sherlock. Yeah, I shouldn’t have done that.” Holmes continued to shout, and John just crossed his arms. They were so tied up with each other that they didn’t notice the dark figure climb onto the roof. More so, they were so entranced that they didn’t notice the figure pull out his weapon.

Sherlock Holmes was so busy yelling at John and trying to get across that he had screwed up that he had to take a few moments to process when John stumbled back and fell to the ground, his brain replaying the haunting sound of the gunshots like a broken record in his mind. “John? John. John, oh God.” His anger and rage had fled from the scene as a squirrel would flee a forest fire. He was no longer concerned with making John know that he had messed up. Instead, he was more concerned with making _himself_ know that John was _alive_. He slid onto his knees next to the ex-soldier, running a hand over his blond hair as he searched for the locations of the wounds.

John’s face had already paled, his breath coming short. The man that had shot him had some pretty decent aim. Blood - John’s blood, to Sherlock’s dismay - was already sliding at a steady rate across the ground. Without a single inch of hesitation, Sherlock tore the ex-army doctor’s shirt open, once he found the location where the wounds lie. “John. John Hamish bloody Watson, don’t you dare do so much as close your eyes,” Sherlock hissed, digging in his pocket for his cell phone. He sat on his knees, frantically dialing the emergency number, giving his name, their location, what happened, and the order to send an ambulance as soon as it could possibly get here. Preferably now. When the call ended, he tossed the phone aside, running his hands over John’s hair, his face, tapping his cheeks to keep the man awake. “Just stay awake. What do I have to do? Sing that stupid musical you’re so gaga over?” Sherlock thought of the song John had been singing while doing the dishes earlier that same day. Some ridiculous song from some ridiculous musical, yet somehow Holmes found himself singing what he knew of the words anyways. It was entitled _Stay Alive_. How fitting.

The famous detective only stopped when John grasped his sleeve, staring up at him. If Sherlock was to be his last sight, so be it. “I don’t see why you’ve never sang to me before,” he muttered, smirking the tiniest pained bit. John. It was always John that brought humour (even if very cheesy humour) into the situation, bringing light to any problem like a torch.

“Shut up. Just shut up, John. You’re being an idiot again. That’s usual. _Shut up_.” He continued to run his fingers over John’s hair, trying to comfort the obviously pained man. “Save your breath for the hospital room. We _will_ get you into a hospital room.”

John stared at him. For a few moments, Sherlock feared he had lost him already. _His John_. The John that had been brought to St. Bart’s Hospital by Mike Stamford. The John that had a psychosomatic limp that magically disappeared when Sherlock dragged him to a rather dangerous case. The John that had left his cane in Angelo’s restaurant, too busy running after the detective. _His bloody John_. Sherlock would refuse to let someone - whether the Sebastian that shot him, a God that he found scientifically improbable, or anyone else - take his John away from him. This man, who was on the ground, bleeding profusely, a smile spreading on his face, was his. His responsibility, his best friend, his life. He wasn’t going to let go very easily.

“Sherl, I was a doctor,” John muttered, grasping Sherlock’s hand. “I’m not a genius, like you, so I might be wrong.” He was going to lose him. He wouldn’t just lose his life, but he’d lose Sherlock, and Sherlock would lose him.

Sherlock continued to watch John quietly, trying to cope with the unimaginable. He stared down at John as new wet spots blossomed on his torn shirt, obviously not from blood to Holmes’ trained eye. He struggled to figure out what it was, peering up at the sky. It wasn’t raining, so it had to be… Good God, he was crying. Sherlock Holmes, known sociopath, was actually crying over the blond under him. “You were a doctor. Right. Name the bones in my hand.” Sherlock frowned at the confused face John made. “Just do it!”

Watson raised a brow, closing his eyes and trying to think of what he had learned in med school. His brain felt as if it had been stuffed with cotton, thoughts being extremely difficult to fully piece together. “Um…” He lifted the detective’s hand, using that as a model to gather his thinking, pointing to each bone as he named it. “Scaphoid. That’s the trapezium bone. Triquetrum. Lunate. I… I can’t remember the rest.” He looked up at the detective’s face, almost apologetically.

“It was just a ploy to keep you awake,” Holmes admitted, looking around. “Where is that bloody ambulance?”

Watson shook his head. He had this urging feeling in his stomach, begging him to just let go. “It’s no use,” he whispered, sucking in as deep a breath as he could, which still didn’t provide much oxygen to his system. He felt lightheaded, knowing he’d pass out soon enough. He closed his eyes, trying to sort out his thoughts.

He woke when the detective tapped his cheek. “No, John, you’re not allowed to die. You can’t. I love you too much for that, you know.”

Watson, who had forever been known as Sherlock’s sidekick, smirked just the tiniest bit. “The truth comes out,” he breathed. “You know, I love you too.”

“Of course I did, John,” Sherlock murmured, brushing the man’s blond hair back. “I’m a genius. It was obvious.”

“You’re a rubbish liar,” John muttered, smirking again. The wailing sirens of the ambulance were getting closer. They just might save him yet. He clutched Sherlock’s hand, squeezing as hard as he could, which wasn’t very hard. Either he’d be saved or he’d die. There was no in between.

However, it was neither his nor Sherlock’s decision to decide whether he lived or died. The grasp of John’s hand did not give him enough power to choose life over death, or death over life. Nor did the power of Sherlock’s mind give him the ability to rescue his best friend with the touch of his hand. No, those are powers not in the spectrum of human ability. It was, unfortunately, the duty of the shooter to decide whether John could continue with his life or die here, on the pavement of a London alley. It wasn’t known whether said shooter wished to simply slow Holmes and Watson down, or if he wished to really slow the detective down by taking away the thing that kept him going - Dr. John Watson.

If John died, Sherlock would be crushed. If he lived, he may be paralyzed, unable to move certain parts of his body. He’d be miserable. But who is to say which either of them would prefer? Their preferences didn’t matter, anyways. It was up to fate to save John Watson, now. Sherlock Holmes had never believed in fate - it was always observation and deduction and figuring outcomes and endgames out on his own. This was not an endgame he could decipher or change, not for the world, not for the entirety of Scotland Yard, not for John Watson.

_His John._


End file.
